Borrowed time
In Harm's Way? Payday Loan Access and Military Personnel Performance
Scott Carrell & Jonathan Zinman
Review of Financial Studies, forthcoming
Abstract:
Does borrowing at 400% APR do more harm than good? The U.S. Department of Defense thinks so and successfully lobbied for a 36% APR cap on loans to servicemen. But existing evidence on how access to high-interest debt affects borrowers is inconclusive. We estimate effects of payday loan access on enlisted personnel using exogenous variation in Air Force rules assigning personnel to bases across the United States, and within-state variation in lending laws over time. Airmen job performance and retention declines with payday loan access, and severely poor readiness increases. These effects are strongest among relatively inexperienced and financially unsophisticated airmen.
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Payday Loans and Consumer Financial Health
Neil Bhutta
Journal of Banking & Finance, forthcoming
Abstract:
The annualized interest rate for a payday loan often exceeds 10 times that of a typical credit card, yet this market grew immensely in the 1990s and 2000s, elevating concerns about the risk payday loans pose to consumers and whether payday lenders target minority neighborhoods. This paper employs individual credit record data, and Census data on payday lender store locations, to assess these concerns. Taking advantage of several state law changes since 2006 and, following previous work, within-state-year differences in access arising from proximity to states that allow payday loans, I find little to no effect of payday loans on credit scores, new delinquencies, or the likelihood of overdrawing credit lines. The analysis also indicates that neighborhood racial composition has little influence on payday lender store locations conditional on income, wealth and demographic characteristics.
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Banks Are Where The Liquidity Is
Oliver Hart & Luigi Zingales
NBER Working Paper, June 2014
Abstract:
What is so special about banks that their demise often triggers government intervention? In this paper we develop a simple model where, even ignoring interconnectedness issues, the failure of a bank causes a larger welfare loss than the failure of other institutions. The reason is that agents in need of liquidity tend to concentrate their holdings in banks. Thus, a shock to banks disproportionately affects the agents who need liquidity the most, reducing aggregate demand and the level of economic activity. In the context of our model, the optimal fiscal response to such a shock is to help people, not banks, and the size of this response should be larger if a bank, rather than a similarly-sized nonfinancial firm, fails.
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The revolving door and worker flows in banking regulation
David Lucca, Amit Seru & Francesco Trebbi
Journal of Monetary Economics, forthcoming
Abstract:
This paper traces career transitions of federal and state U.S. banking regulators from a large sample of publicly available curricula vitae, and provides basic facts on worker flows between the regulatory and private sector resulting from the revolving door. We find strong countercyclical net worker flows into regulatory jobs, driven largely by higher gross outflows into the private sector during booms. These worker flows are also driven by state-specific banking conditions as measured by local banks' profitability, asset quality and failure rates. The regulatory sector seems to experience a retention challenge over time, with shorter regulatory spells for workers, and especially those with higher education. Evidence from cross-state enforcement actions of regulators shows gross inflows into regulation and gross outflows from regulation are both higher during periods of intense enforcement, though gross outflows are significantly smaller in magnitude. These results appear inconsistent with a “quid-pro-quo” explanation of the revolving door, but consistent with a “regulatory schooling” hypothesis.
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The Variance in Foreclosure Spillovers across Neighborhood Types
Keith Ihlanfeldt & Tom Mayock
Public Finance Review, forthcoming
Abstract:
The estimation of foreclosure spillover effects has been the subject of a number of studies following the most recent housing market crash. An important issue largely overlooked by these studies is the extent to which these spillovers vary across neighborhoods. In this article, we use data from the South Florida metropolitan area to study the variance in these foreclosure spillovers across neighborhoods with different income levels and racial concentrations. We find that the largest foreclosure spillovers occur in higher-income neighborhoods. In low-income, minority neighborhoods, we find no evidence of spillover effects. The results have important implications for local governments.
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Complex Securities and Underwriter Reputation: Do Reputable Underwriters Produce Better Securities?
John Griffin, Richard Lowery & Alessio Saretto
Review of Financial Studies, forthcoming
Abstract:
Conventional wisdom suggests that high-reputation banks will generally produce good securities to maintain their long-run reputation. We show with a simple model that, when securities are complex a high-reputation bank may produce assets that underperform during market downturns. We examine this possibility using a unique sample of $10.1 trillion of CLO, MBS, ABS, and CDOs. Contrary to the conventional view, securities issued by more reputable banks did not outperform but, rather, had higher proportions of capital in default.
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The Role of Proximity in Foreclosure Externalities: Evidence from Condominiums
Lynn Fisher, Lauren Lambie-Hanson & Paul Willen
NBER Working Paper, April 2014
Abstract:
We measure the effect of foreclosures on the sale prices of nearby properties using a dataset of condominiums in Boston. A foreclosure in the same association and at the same address depresses the sale price by 2.5 percent, but properties in the same association but located at a different address have an effect that is tightly estimated at zero. Since properties in the same association are close substitutes, we argue that the evidence points against the pecuniary externality of property coming on the market and toward a physical externality as the source of measured foreclosure externalities.
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Bankruptcy Law and the Cost of Credit: The Impact of Cramdown on Mortgage Interest Rates
Joshua Goodman & Adam Levitin
Journal of Law and Economics, February 2014, Pages 139-158
Abstract:
Recent proposals to address housing market troubles through principal modification could increase the cost of credit in the mortgage market. We explore this possibility using historical variation in federal judicial rulings regarding whether Chapter 13 bankruptcy filers could reduce the principal owed on a home loan to the home’s market value. The practice, known as cramdown, was definitively prohibited by the Supreme Court in 1993. We find that home loans closed during the time when cramdown was allowed had interest rates 12–16 basis points higher than loans closed in the same state when cramdown was not allowed, which translates to a roughly 1 percent increase in monthly payments. Consistent with the theory that lenders are pricing in the risk of principal modification, interest rate increases are higher for the riskiest borrowers and zero for the least risky and higher in states where Chapter 13 filing is more common.
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The US finance wage premium before and after the financial crisis: A decomposition exercise
Stella Capuano, Tat-kei Lai & Hans-Jörg Schmerer
Applied Economics Letters, forthcoming
Abstract:
Does the recent financial crisis change the wage structures of the US finance and nonfinance sectors? In this article, we study the wage gap between workers in these two sectors between 1990 and 2011. Using data from the Current Population Survey, we find that the finance wage premium increased over time and only dropped modestly during the crisis. Using the Oaxaca–Blinder method to decompose the wage gap into ‘explained’ and ‘unexplained’ parts, we also find that the wage gap was entirely driven by unexplained factors.
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Wishful Thinking or Effective Threat? Tightening Bank Resolution Regimes and Bank Risk-Taking
Magdalena Ignatowski & Josef Korte
Journal of Financial Stability, forthcoming
Abstract:
We propose a framework for testing the effects of changes in bank resolution regimes on bank behavior. By exploiting the differential relevance of recent changes in U.S. bank resolution (i.e., the introduction of the Orderly Liquidation Authority, OLA) for different types of banks, we are able to simulate a quasi-natural experiment using a difference-in-difference framework. We find that banks that are more affected by the introduction of the OLA (1) significantly decrease their overall risk-taking and (2) shift their loan origination toward lower risk, indicating the general effectiveness of the regime change. This effect, however, does (3) not hold for the largest and most systemically important banks. Hence, the introduction of the OLA in the U.S. alone does not appear to have solved the too-big-to-fail problem and might need to be complemented with other measures to limit financial institutions’ risk-taking.
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Monetary policy and the transaction role of money in the United States
Alexander Kriwoluzky & Christian Stoltenberg
Economic Journal, forthcoming
Abstract:
The declining importance of money in transactions can explain the well-known fact that U.S. interest rate policy was passive in the pre-Volcker period and active after 1982. We generalise a standard cashless New Keynesian model (Woodford, 2003) by incorporating an explicit transaction role for money. In the pre-Volcker period, we estimate that money did play an important role and determinacy required a passive interest rate policy. However, after 1982, money no longer played an important role in facilitating transactions. Correspondingly, the conventional view prevails and an active policy ensured equilibrium determinacy.
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The Dark Side of Sunshine: Regulatory Oversight and Status Quo Bias
Michael Collins & Carly Urban
Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization, forthcoming
Abstract:
As the mortgage foreclosure crisis accelerated in the U.S. in the late 2000s, state-level policymakers implemented measures designed to protect consumers and stem the tide of foreclosures. One form of policy was simply to require lenders to report on foreclosure prevention activities. Such policies represented a shift from the status quo for mortgage loan servicing firms operating under incomplete information — doing nothing with non-paying loans while waiting for more information to be revealed — to either foreclosing on the borrower or offering the borrower a modification of loan terms. Using a difference-in-difference-in-differences empirical strategy, we exploit one policy implemented in Maryland for a subset of mortgage servicers and find evidence that firms perform more loan modifications, as well as file more foreclosures. Increasing foreclosure filings was contrary to the intent of the policy, suggesting that policymakers should be aware of how firms exhibit systematic biases, much like individuals.
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Neighborhood Impact of Foreclosure: A Quantile Regression Approach
Lei Zhang & Tammy Leonard
Regional Science and Urban Economics, forthcoming
Abstract:
This paper uses quantile regression, while accounting for spatial autocorrelation, to examine the simultaneous space-time impact of foreclosures on neighborhood property values. We find that negative price externalities associated with neighborhood foreclosures are greatest (1) among lower-priced homes, (2) within 250 feet of the property and (3) in the 12 months following a foreclosure auction. By using quantile regression, we are able to also investigate changes in the distribution of house prices associated with varying levels of neighborhood foreclosures.
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A Comparative Study of the Forecasting Performance of Three International Organizations
Pingfan Hong & Zhibo Tan
Journal of Policy Modeling, forthcoming
Abstract:
This article evaluates and compares the forecasting performance of three international organizations: the United Nations, the International Monetary Fund and the World Bank. The annual forecasts made by the United Nations in the period of 1981-2011 are found to be fairly robust, in terms of bias and efficiency. In comparison, the forecasting performance of the United Nations is found to be marginally better than the other two organizations during the period of 2000-2012. However, the forecasts of all these organizations missed the Great Recession of 2009 by a large margin.
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State Foreclosure Laws and the Incidence of Mortgage Default
Cem Demiroglu, Evan Dudley & Christopher James
Journal of Law and Economics, February 2014, Pages 225-280
Abstract:
This paper examines how differences in state foreclosure laws influence the incidence of default in the residential mortgage market. In particular, we examine how judicial review requirements, lenders’ recourse rights (deficiency judgments), and state assistance programs for distressed borrowers affected the likelihood of default during the recent U.S. housing crisis. We argue that state foreclosure laws should have little effect on the likelihood of liquidity events (for example, shocks to borrowers’ ability to make payments) and thus provide a good instrument for identifying borrowers’ costs of default. We find that borrowers with negative home equity are significantly more likely to default in states with borrower-friendly foreclosure laws. Finally, we examine how recent state and federal loan foreclosure prevention programs affected the likelihood of default. Overall, we find a significant decline in the effect of judicial review requirements but not deficiency judgments on default after 2008.
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Did Railroads Make Antebellum U.S. Banks More Sound?
Jeremy Atack, Matthew Jaremski & Peter Rousseau
NBER Working Paper, April 2014
Abstract:
We investigate the relationships of bank failures and balance sheet conditions with measures of proximity to different forms of transportation in the United States over the period from 1830-1860. A series of hazard models and bank-level regressions indicate a systematic relationship between proximity to railroads (but not to other means of transportation) and “good” banking outcomes. Although railroads improved economic conditions along their routes, we offer evidence of another channel. Specifically, railroads facilitated better information flows about banks that led to modifications in bank asset composition consistent with reductions in the incidence of moral hazard.
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Samuel Hanson
Journal of Financial Economics, August 2014, Pages 270–299
Abstract:
Most home mortgages in the United States are fixed-rate loans with an embedded prepayment option. When long-term rates decline, the effective duration of mortgage-backed securities (MBS) falls due to heightened refinancing expectations. I show that these changes in MBS duration function as large-scale shocks to the quantity of interest rate risk that must be borne by professional bond investors. I develop a simple model in which the risk tolerance of bond investors is limited in the short run, so these fluctuations in MBS duration generate significant variation in bond risk premia. Specifically, bond risk premia are high when aggregate MBS duration is high. The model offers an explanation for why long-term rates could appear to be excessively sensitive to movements in short rates and explains how changes in MBS duration act as a positive-feedback mechanism that amplifies interest rate volatility. I find strong support for these predictions in the time series of US government bond returns.
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Credit CARD Act of 2009: What Did Banks Do?
Vikram Jambulapati & Joanna Stavins
Journal of Banking & Finance, September 2014, Pages 21–30
Abstract:
The Credit CARD Act of 2009 was intended to prevent practices in the credit card industry that lawmakers viewed as deceptive and abusive. Among other changes, the Act restricted issuers’ account closure policies, eliminated certain fees, and made it more difficult for issuers to change terms on credit card plans. Critics of the Act argued that because of the long lag between approval and implementation of the law, issuing banks would be able to take preemptive actions that might disadvantage cardholders before the law could take effect. Using credit bureau data as well as individual data from a survey of U.S. consumers, we test whether banks closed consumers’ credit card accounts or otherwise restricted access to credit just before the enactment of the CARD Act. Because the period prior to the enactment of the CARD Act coincided with the financial crisis and recession, causality in this case is particularly difficult to establish. We find evidence that a higher fraction of credit card accounts were closed following the Federal Reserve Board’s adoption of its credit card rules, but not between May 2009, when the CARD Act was signed, and when most of its provisions became law in February 2010. However, we do find evidence that banks deteriorated terms of credit card plans at a higher rate during this period, especially lowered the credit limits. Among the survey respondents whose bank accounts were closed during that period, account holders were much more likely to close their own credit card accounts than to have them closed by their card issuers.
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Local Banking Panics of the 1920s: Identification and Determinants
Lee Davison & Carlos Ramirez
Journal of Monetary Economics, September 2014, Pages 164–177
Abstract:
Using a newly discovered dataset of U.S. bank suspensions from 1921 to 1929, we discovered that banking panics were more common in the 1920s than had been believed. Besides identifying panics, we investigate their determinants, finding that local banking panics were more likely when fundamental economic conditions were generally weak and more likely in “overbanked” states; they were less likely in states with deposit insurance or states where a relatively large share of banks belonged to chain banking organizations.